Only two England players have scored their runs at a faster rate than Jos Buttler. Since both Glen Chapple and Alan Wells played one game each and scored a total of 29 runs between them, Buttler is the true leader of this increasingly significant field.

His own limited-overs career is still embryonic but after 18
matches all things are possible now. The latest spectacular
intervention at Cardiff on Saturday, when he scored 65 from 45
balls, took his career scoring rate to 128.64 per 100 balls and
stewarded England to an improbable victory by three wickets.

It also had the welcome additional effect of reinvigorating the
NatWest Series. Another rained-off match or an Australian victory
would have left Monday’s final match at the Rose Bowl looking
decidedly fag-end forlorn. As it is, the series stands at 1-1 and
after Buttler’s thrilling endeavours there is the real sense of
something to play for.

Buttler is fearless, unselfish and innovative. The speed of his
hands, the weight of his shot and his belief that he can hit the
ball a long way from almost any angle make him invariably worth
watching.

He has failed as often as he has succeeded, with six of his 13
innings having lasted four balls or fewer. But that is the nature
of what he does in the role of No 7, where he is frequently either
finishing off the first innings or trying to perform a rapid
salvage operation in the second.

When he comes off – and he does often enough for it to matter,
which is of course the secret – he changes the complexion of
affairs. He did so earlier this season when his 47 from 32 balls at
Trent Bridge against New Zealand took England to an impregnable
position, and he had first burst into the consciousness as an
international when he made 32 from 10 balls in a Twenty20 match
against South Africa last year.

Buttler had a little more time at his disposal when he came in
at Sophia Gardens on Saturday. England were 126 for 5, which
represented a recovery from 8 for 3 following Clint McKay’s
hat-trick. But with both Eoin Morgan and Michael Carberry out at an
inopportune time, it needed swiftness as well as pragmatism from
Buttler.

He executed his assault perfectly, given crucial assistance by
Ben Stokes, who demonstrated the virtue of a long tail. Given out
lbw on 8, Buttler invoked DRS to save himself and, despite
occasional aberrant running, barely played a false stroke
afterwards.

He finished it in style, which is the hallmark of all those
touched by genius, picking up Mitchell Johnson for a leg-side six
while seemingly off balance and then drilling a straight four with
three balls left.

England, perhaps stubbornly but also justifiably, retained an
unchanged side for the third consecutive match (it would probably
have been the fourth but teams were not exchanged at Headingley,
where the first match was abandoned). They will presumably do so
again today, which should offer Carberry another chance to show his
credentials and James Tredwell the opportunity to persuade
Australia that they should really have a bash at targeting someone
else.

Carberry played an admirably determined hand after England’s
early setbacks when it seemed they might make a mess of chasing
Australia’s 227. The tourists were indebted to a bristling innings
of 87 from George Bailey to take them so far.

Both England’s strike bowlers struck and Boyd Rankin, the
powerhouse Irish farmer, is making a dedicated assault on the
selectors’ minds for a place in the Ashes squad, which will
be named next Monday.